Board will approve $4 million in athletic donations
September 3, 2014
Staff Report
The UK Board of Trustees will have the option to approve nearly $4 million in donations geared toward athletics on Friday.
Most of the donations, which come from three UK alumni and women’s basketball coach Matthew Mitchell, will go to funding UK’s new football practice facility and practice fields.
Chris T. Sullivan, a founder of OSI Restaurant Partners and Outback Steakhouse, has pledged $1 million to go directly toward the new facility. It’s the largest contribution to be approved by the board of the donations set to be approved later this week. Sullivan graduated from UK in 1972 with a business degree.
Mitchell, along with his wife Jenna, has also pledged $1 million to the program. The Mitchells’ contribution will be paid in 10 annual installments, starting this year.
A nearly $900,000 gift will come from Roger Nicholson, who got his Juris Doctorate from the University of Kentucky College of Law in 1986. Nicholson works in the coal and natural resources industries.
M. Lynn Parrish, who attended UK from 1967 to 1971, has pledged $800,000 to go to capital projects for the athletics program. Parrish, the former president of Coal-Mac Inc. in Holden, W. Va. and Knott-Floyd Land Company in Eastern Kentucky also pledged $150,000 over ten years to the construction of the Wildcat Coal Lodge. He is currently the president of Marwood Land Company, Inc. in Pikeville, Ky. and the director of Community Trust Bancorp Inc.
The new practice facility will cost $45 million and is expected to be finished in 2016. While designs of the facility have not yet been made public, plans have been made to build it on the backside of Nutter Indoor Training Facility, adjacent to Commonwealth Stadium. The facility will reportedly cover 100,000 square feet. The construction will take place simultaneously with the renovations to Commonwealth Stadium, which are scheduled to be finished in 2015.
Friday’s board meeting, where the donations will be approved, will commence at 1 p.m. The University Athletics Committee meeting will be held at 9:30 p.m. on Friday in the 18th floor of Patterson Office Tower.
